Crappy weather is keeping me from updating as often as I'd like. It thawed out a little today so I'm updating this while I can. We're getting more bad weather soon but hopefully it won't be like this last bout we've had. Thanks for reading!
Chapter Thirty Seven
The temperature was still hovering near sixty, causing him to shed the jacket as he walked. He wasn't hunting. They didn't need the meat and for the first time in a long time he just wasn't in the mood. He had left because there was no way he was going to live down the scene that Piper had caused earlier and Carol was just better at dealing with the teasing shit from everyone. He didn't know what the big deal was. Back when Abe and Rosita were sneaking off together all the time no one made a big deal of it. But he knew people would rib him until he wanted to hit them and he wasn't going to subject himself to that torment just yet.
He also just needed to get away for a while. He needed to think about things and he hadn't been able to do that the last few days. What he had wanted to do, after he realized that staying away from Carol wasn't an option, was take things easy. Talk to her. Build that trust back up and then jump back into whatever they had started all those months ago. It just didn't happen like that. He hated that there was no middle ground with them. Their relationship went from nothing to everything in one huge leap. He thought maybe that was where he had went wrong the last time so this time was going to be different. But it had all happened all over again. One thing led to another and that led them to jumping into bed together.
Any other man would have probably been okay with that but he wasn't so sure. He was putting too much of himself out there again and he couldn't stop himself. He didn't truly think that she would make the same mistakes. If she was going to leave him then she would have done it when he had treated her like she wasn't there. But he wasn't sure if he would ever be able to shake that fear. Maybe after enough time had passed.
He veered off from the beach, heading towards the woods. Since he was out he may as well at least try to kill something. He was almost to the trees when he heard the sound of someone shouting in the distance. He turned sharply and sure enough, Rick was barreling towards him. His heart sank to his boots as he took off towards him. What the hell could have happened that would have Rick charging him like this? Walkers? One of those rogue groups they had been warned about?
Once he was closer Rick stopped, bracing his hands on his knees as he tried to catch his breath.
"What the fuck happened?" Daryl barked, dread filling his voice.
Rick straightened up. "You gotta come back. No one is hurt or anything but you need to talk to Piper," Rick managed.
Daryl didn't wait around to ask any questions. If there was something wrong with the girl then he needed to get to her. That dread hadn't let go of him. Rick wouldn't have came looking for him unless something was terribly wrong. It didn't matter that she wasn't hurt. There was something wrong and he wasn't there. He ran harder, his legs burning with the exertion. He was getting soft now that they had been able to finally relax and it felt like he wasn't gaining any ground.
When he finally made it to the wall he almost crashed through it in his haste. His eyes scanned the area but he didn't see Piper or Carol anywhere. He felt a little relieved when Lydon jogged towards him.
"Where the fuck is she?" Daryl panted.
Lydon pointed to the room. "I don't know what happened. Everything was okay and then all of a sudden Piper was going the hell off about something. Carol tried to calm her down but she just stormed off to her room."
"You don't know what caused it?" Daryl asked, catching his breath.
Lydon shook his head. "Rick said something to her and she just went off."
"What the hell did he say to her?" Daryl asked, rage building inside of him like a living coiling thing.
Lydon shrugged. "I wasn't paying attention but Carol told Rick to go find you and he just took off. When you find out something can you let me know that she's okay?"
They were walking towards the rooms and Daryl paused outside of the door and looked at the boy. The kid looked like he really just wanted to bust the door down and figure things out for himself but he was holding back. "I'll let you know kid," he said before slipping into the room.
Piper was pacing back and forth and Carol was leaned against the counter watching her. When they looked up and saw him Carol looked like she was about to faint with relief.
"We need to talk for a minute," Carol said as she walked forward and grabbed his arm.
Piper spun around, her face an angry mask. "No, fuck that! You're gonna tell me right now what the hell is going on. Who the fuck are you people?"
Daryl frowned and looked back at Carol. "Piper, just hold the hell on for a minute. What the hell happened?" Daryl asked.
Carol grabbed his hand and started moving towards the door. Piper tried to follow but he gave her a look that stopped her. Piper glared and crossed her arms over her chest. When Carol finally had him outside the door he expected her to drop his hand but instead hers tightened in his. The look in her eyes had him bracing himself. He had never seen it before.
"Tell me what the fuck Rick said to her," he growled. He knew that Piper was a handful and he knew that she pushed buttons on purpose but Rick had no fucking right saying something that would upset her this much.
"Daryl, I think... I think Piper is your niece. I think Merle is her father," Carol said carefully.
Daryl scowled. What the fuck was she talking about? Sure the kid had some of Merle's infuriating characteristics but that didn't mean shit. They had scared the shit out of him thinking that there was something wrong and this was the reason? He snorted. "Have you lost your goddamn mind? That kid ain't Merle's. If he did have some kid out there what would the odds be of her findin' me, of all people?"
Carol shook her head. "You don't understand. Rick told her that he was going to start calling her baby Merle because she was giving him a hard time. As soon as he said it she just... she went off. Somehow she learned before all of this that a man named Merle got her mother addicted to drugs and then got her pregnant. When he took off she gave Piper up. Daryl... I really believe that she is Merle's daughter. I think she's your niece."
Daryl shook his head. He wasn't even going to let the idea sit long enough to take root in his mind. The chances of him having nieces and nephews out there somewhere were probably high. Merle was Merle, after all and he very well could have fathered a whole football team. But the likelihood of one of them finding Daryl, on accident, in this mess was too far fetched for him to believe. "It had to have been someone else. She ain't Merle's. She can't be."
"What makes you so sure?" Carol asked gently.
He shook his head again. "Because! How the fuck could it be? It's impossible."
"Daryl, I'm not so sure. You need to talk to her. Figure out if she knows anything else. The more information we have to go on, the easier it will be to tell if it's true. So far she knows her father was a man named Merle who had a drug problem and left her mom after she got pregnant. Maybe she has more facts but you have to at least try."
He put his hand on the doorknob. "Let's talk to her then."
She nodded and followed him back into the room. Piper was sitting on the bed, chewing on her nails. When she looked up her eyes met his and he studied her closely, trying to see some resemblance to his brother. There really wasn't one though. Her eyes were light green, her hair was dark red, her stature was unusually small even for her age. He knew when Merle wasn't buzzing all of his hair off it was curly like hers but there were millions of people in the world with curly hair. All of her features were delicate, much to delicate to resemble his brother. If there was a chance she was his brother's then she must have gotten all of her looks from her mother.
And then she pushed her hair behind her ears and he narrowed his eyes. It was something so small he had never noticed before. Those fucking ears. Ears that had always pissed him off because the tips of them always seemed to poke out, making him look like some kind of goofy little kid. Just like elf ears without the damn point. It was something small. Very small. But once he realized that the kid had those same goddamn ears he looked even more closely. He knew for a fact he had never slept with some random woman so if she wasn't his blood somehow then why did she have the misfortune of inheriting his stupid elf ears?
And suddenly that wasn't the only thing that was starting to stand out. Her eyes were large but the shape resembled Merle's from years ago. Her nose was small but the subtle curve was a lot similar to Merle's nose. The rest was probably from her mother but there was enough there, now that he looked hard enough, to give him pause.
"Tell me," she demanded, her teeth clenched and her eyes flashing angrily.
He didn't even know what to say.
Carol gave his arm a gentle squeeze. "I think I'm gonna go ahead and wait outside."
He nodded. A part of him wanted her there but another part thought that he should do this on his own. When the closed Piper stood up.
"I know you know him," she said bitterly. "I'm not an idiot. Where the hell is he? Who the hell is he?" Her eyes were hard but he saw the pain there.
Daryl cleared his throat. "He's dead," he said, his voice barely above a whisper.
She nodded, still almost vibrating with rage. "I fuckin' knew it. I knew that they knew him as soon as Dick called me that."
Daryl nodded. "Yeah. We knew him." He couldn't keep the hurt from his voice. No matter what Merle had done, he was the only family Daryl had had and he had loved him, no matter his faults.
"So what was he to you. You guys dope buddies or something?"
He shook his head. "What all do you know about your parents? Tell me everything and then I'll tell you."
She ran a hand through her hair. "I had a designated Social Worker that was always on my case about shit. I was in her office all the time and noticed this fucking folder she always got out whenever I was in there. I knew it had answers to who the hell I was so one night I snuck out. I was staying with these doper foster parents and left as soon as they passed out. I broke into the building and found my file."
"What'd it say? Tell me everything you remember."
She snorted. "My egg donor was some upper class kid from North Carolina. She got accepted to a college in Atlanta Georgia. Shortly after that I guess her life went to shit because the paperwork was just lists of minor drug arrests and rehabs. Then I found this fucking letter she had written that I was suppose to get when I turned eighteen. Some bullshit sob story about how bad her life had gotten after getting involved with my bio dad, who she called Merle. She made it a point to blame him for all of it and I guess she had every right, huh? Her life hadn't been too bad till he showed up. And that's pretty much all I know. I didn't try to find her. I didn't have the resources. I knew she was somewhere in North Carolina though cause that's where I was born. Now what the hell was this asshole to you?"
Daryl was having a hard time keeping his emotions reigned in because he was almost certain now. He even remembered this girl that Merle had messed around with for a while that had been a student at AU. He only remembered cause he knew that if she stayed around his brother for long, her life was surely going to start down a dark path. Apparently Daryl had been right. He couldn't help but wonder if Merle knew about Piper, though. He had a lot of faults but family meant something to Merle. Just like it meant something to Daryl. Blood mattered and it always would. Surely he would have done something differently if he knew he had a daughter on the way.
"Daryl, just tell me," she said, her voice catching.
"He was my brother."
She blinked, the anger falling away as confusion took hold of her. She shook her head and her eyes started to shine with unshed tears. She tried to storm past him but he grabbed her arm. He understood her need to escape but he couldn't let her do that. He wouldn't let her do that. He wasn't sure how to feel about this. She had gone all this time thinking that she didn't have a family and now she just found out that the father she had spent her whole life hating was dead. Her face crumpled, the last of the anger falling away and the pain he saw there caused him to flinch. One small tug on his part was all it took for her to bury her face in his chest, her arms going around him, holding on tightly.
He wasn't sure what to do then, but suddenly he realized, with a jolt, that this was blood. This was a piece of his brother. He had no doubts anymore. Maybe he should have but in that moment he was sure that she was, indeed, a Dixon. Hesitatingly his arms went around her and her small frame shook with a gut wrenching sob and her arms tightened further. He held her like that until she finally seemed to cry herself out. His shirt was soaked but he didn't mind.
She finally loosened her grip on him and then stepped away, keeping her head down and swiping at her eyes. "This is to fucked up for words," she muttered, her voice horse.
He nodded even though she wasn't looking at him. "Yeah. It is."